Anyway, it seems there is a homeopathic vaccination for smallpox. How, thought I to myself, can they make this? After all, smallpox has been extinct in the wild since the late 1970s. Trust Dr Crislip to enlighten me: homeopaths rely on ‘nosodes’. A ‘nosode’

’is a homeopathic remedy prepared from a pathological specimen. The specimen is taken from a diseased animal or person and may consist of saliva, pus, urine, blood, or diseased tissue.’

Bleuch. This is, um, rather worse than what is wrongly claimed to be in actual vaccinations. Just as well it’s diluted to the point where there’s nothing left 🙂 But whence comes the nosode for smallpox? Dr Crislip also wants to know:

And they have a nosode for smallpox? It is supposedly derived from the ripened pustule of a smallpox patient and I have to wonder about their source. There has been no smallpox in the world since the mid 1970â€²s, either they have a stock of smallpox that they feed like sourdough starter or they are not really selling the real deal.

BioBlog is the home of Dr Alison Campbell, a science communicator and senior lecturer in biological sciences at the
University of Waikato. You'll find a fair bit of biology here and ruminations on science in general.

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